More Than Life
Domesticity is unusual.
Jane hasn't quite adjusted to it, honestly, and she supposes she never will. Years of practice at being one way have ruined her for anything else, though she's hardly pining to be a house wife. She still approaches day to day tasks with the same attention to detail and (neurotic) work ethic she always has, she still pours herself into her work with the FBI, with the team, with Kurt Weller—her husband.
She's worn her wedding ring for over three years now, and that word, husband, still sends a thrill through her. It still makes her grin whenever she wakes up and watches him sleep in the early hours of the morning before work. She still loves it when she catches him staring at her during a debrief when he clearly should be focusing his attention elsewhere. She still wishes that life had allowed them to find one another sooner—that there had been less suffering.
Then again, as much as she loves him, as much as she can't imagine life without him, or remember it before—there are days she's not sure how she puts up with Kurt at all. And this morning, on a sunny Sunday at the beach, she's reminded that she not only married an FBI agent, but also a perpetual man-child.
Jane's always thought the whole saying till-death-do-us-part felt unnecessarily morbid, until she has to talk herself out of strangling Kurt with the bed sheets. It would be so easy...
"Stop writing on me, Kurt."
Jane looks up from her book with an exasperated sigh, the one she's been trying to enjoy for the better part of the morning, much to Kurt's annoyance. He's got other ideas on how he'd like to be spending their vacation time, and while he has her in bed, reading books isn't exactly what's on his agenda. So he's retaliating in the only way he knows how, which is by trying to annoy her as much as humanly possible without her following through on the death-by-bed-sheets threat.
He's pushing the envelope dangerously close.
When she glances over her shoulder, he's sprawled out on the bed at her feet, cheap hotel pen in hand as it hovers over her calf, where he's been drawing God knows what. Of all the things Kurt is, artistic is not one of them. He smiles innocently, but his boyish charm isn't fooling anyone, least of all her.
"You let Ava do it all the time," he points out as she attempts to kick him away with her feet.
"Ava is three," Jane sets her book on the bedside table, rolling from her stomach to her back, "you are forty."
"I'm thirty-nine for two more months, thank you very much," Kurt feigns injury, capping the pen and tossing it to the side. He crawls across her to his side of the bed, flopping down beside her. "Besides," Kurt leans over her, brushing her hair back from her face before placing a kiss against her forehead, and the once, quickly, to her lips, "Ava would like it."
Her interest piques at that, and when Kurt pulls away Jane draws her left knee to her chest, turning her leg to the side to inspect the area Kurt had been scribbling in, the negative space between part of the topography maps along her inner calf.
It's just three words.
I love you.
The three words that their daughter, Ava, loved to say to Jane more than anything else.
"She would love it," Jane agrees, and a swell of unexpected emotion hits her, one of longing and overwhelming joy that causes her chest to tighten, and for her eyes to sting, because moments like these left her in awe in spite of herself. How is it possible, she wonders, to have gotten so lucky? But there's a sadness there too, because this is the first trip they've taken without Ava, the first time they've ever been away from her for longer than twenty-four hours, and if there's one thing in her role as wife and mother that Jane's adjusted to well, it's being overprotective. She's perfected it to a fault.
She knows that Ava's safe at home with Sarah and Sawyer in New York City, but it doesn't make it any easier. Her arms feel numb, and she can imagine the ghost of her daughter's weight in them, and as lovely as their private suite on the beach has been, it makes her ache for home.
She can't remember, with the exception of Kurt, ever having cared for someone else as much as her beautiful baby girl. And that kind of care, that unconditional love, is the kind that hurts the worst.
"We don't have to stay," Kurt says softly, reading her mind, "we can spend vacation at home, too. It's only a couple hours drive."
Jane considers the offer, considers him from where she lies on the bed, and she knows that he feels it just as much as she does—the pull of gravity back towards the one thing their world revolves around. If she wants to leave, there's no need to convince him. Jane didn't realize just how much she loved Kurt, how naive she had been to think she couldn't possible love him more, until she watched him hold Ava for the first time. Kurt's been at the mercy of his child since the day she was born, and Jane imagines it would remain that way for a very, very long time. He'd run back to her in an instant, just like he's ready to now.
"I know we promised we'd take time for just us," Jane murmurs, reaching her hands up and framing Kurt's face, "but I think we should go home."
"Then we will," Kurt nods, "I'll pack our bags."
He doesn't ask any questions, doesn't try to convince her one way or the other, he's simply there, her touchstone. He's always waiting to do whatever she needs him to do, be whoever she needs him to be, and right now he's being a great father and husband.
She doesn't deserve him. She's never felt like she has.
"Hey, wait—" He moves to stand up, but Jane stops him when she grabs his wrist, pulling him back to her as she sits up with him. Before he realizes what she's doing, she's wrapped her arms around his neck, finding his lips with her own, more than happy to have him respond in equal fervor as he deepens the kiss. Kurt growls against her mouth, pleasantly surprised at the quick turn of the tables, and she leans back into the bed, drawing him down with her.
This is the other thing that hasn't changed, her need for him is just as strong now as it ever was, perhaps even more so. She craves his touch, just as much as her lungs crave oxygen, but she would gladly suffocate for his kisses—she almost always does.
Kurt's mouth is relentless, his hands skimming underneath the edge of her shirt, along the flat of her stomach, and then dipping beneath the waist of her shorts alongside her hips. He straddles her, his hips pinning her in place, and it isn't until they break apart to catch their breaths that they remember just moments before they were planning on leaving. Jane glances to the side, looking at the watch on Kurt's wrist, his hands having left their place along her body to pin her own wrists above her head on the bed.
"If we leave by lunch, we'll be home in time for dinner," Kurt assures her, and Jane debates briefly, before nodding in agreement.
She stares up at Kurt, and she can't help but smile at him, because her heart is too full not too. She knows there will never be enough words in any language to ever tell him just how much he means to her, but she tries. What she says next has him smiling so brightly that he could light up the entire room, and he does.
"I love you, too."
This was a prompt I received on tumblr (I can't remember who sent it, but you are a rockstar!) a while ago, but I keep forgetting to throw it up here for everyone else to read. It's probably one of my favorite fluff things I've ever written. I need to write more of this married Jeller world because I like it lots. Yes I dooooo. The name Ava is a variant of Eve, who's meaning simply means "life." Ava can also be traced back to the latin word "avis", which simply means "bird." It reminded me of the tattoo on Jane's neck. x)
Soundtrack: "More Than Life" by Whitely.
Lemme know what ya think! As always, y'alls reviews are much appreciate. xo